The Australia India Institute was honoured to host India’s Minister of Commerce and Industry, Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution and Textiles, The Hon. Piyush Goyal, and Australia’s Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment, The Hon Dan Tehan MP to celebrate the historic India-Australia Economic Cooperation and Trade Agreement (IndAus ECTA).
The event also featured remarks from Chancellor of the University of Melbourne, and Chairman of the Australia India Institute, Mr. Allan Myers AO, and Provost of University of Melbourne, Professor Nicola Phillips, on the importance of education to the bilateral relationship.
Following their remarks, both Ministers sat down for a brief Q+A with the audience, moderated by Professor Nicola Phillips.
“When we look at India, our people are our biggest strength. This gives Australia a huge opportunity to be part of our growth story,” Minister Goyal said.
“Given the nature of this agreement, we want to look and see if we can expand mobility into other areas so down the track, we will look at other sections of society that we need here in the workforce to continue developing this agreement,” Minister Tehan said.
“Ever since Prime Minister Modi came to Australia in November of 2014, I think our relations have been on an upwards trajectory,” Minister Goyal said.
Minister Goyal noted: “The potential of this relationship is huge. We have set very modest targets — we are looking at taking $26/27 billion bilateral trade to $50 billion in the next 5 years. I would suggest that our teams seriously drill down sector by sector, be more ambitious, and aim for $140 billion bilateral trade, shall we say by 2030?”, to which Minister Tehan replied, “Let’s do it”.
The audience consisted of government officials, industry groups, business leaders and representatives from the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), the Australia India Business Council (AIBC) and various other organisations.
The Institute will support the delivery of the IndAus ECTA ‘Unity Agreement’ to ensure the bilateral economic engagement between both nations continues to reach new heights.
